Colorado Newsletter #00

Longren Colorado Newsletter #00 - 17.11.2024

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Hello friends and family,

In the last letter, I mentioned briefly a new

job I have based out of Colorado. Here, I'd like

to geek out and tell you all about what I am

doing now for work.

At the South Pole, there are four main science

projects that each send a pair of technicians

to take year-long stints of work there. Of these

projects, three are telescopes: the South Pole

Telescope, the BICEP Array, and the IceCube

Neutrino Observatory. The fourth project focuses

on atmospheric research, run by the National

Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

Lastly, there are two general technicians, or

research associates, that support many projects.

That amounts to ten science-types who remain at

the station over the winter, which is about a

quarter of the total winterover population.

The Atmospheric Research Observatory (ARO) at the

South Pole is the smaller blue building. The path

leading off to the right leads to the telescopes.

(A. V. Williams)

As for me, I've been fortunate enough to get a

job as one of NOAA's technicians in their Global

Monitoring Laboratory (GML). While as a whole

GML has about 120 people working towards the goal

of "taking the pulse of the planet", I work as

part of a small team of technicians in the

Observatories and Operations (OBOP) division.

Together, we keep each of NOAA's four Atmospheric

Baseline Observatories (ABOs) running and

collecting quality data. I know those were a lot

of acronyms, but can you expect anything less?

This is a government job, afterall.

I'll be based in Boulder, Colorado for the next

year, where I'll support all four ABOs remotely.

Then, I'll head to the South Pole in Oct. 2025,

where I will stay for about 13 months.

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From north to south, the ABOs are located at:

Barrow, Alaska; Mauna Loa, Hawaii;

American Samoa; South Pole, Antarctica. (NOAA)

Each of these locations is in a remote location,

away from both human-made and natural pollutants.

That allows the air samples to be made on some of

the cleanest air in the world. Plus, a wide range

of latitudes is covered by the stations, from the

most northern point in Alaska to the farthest

south point on Earth. Together, the clean air and

large coverage of the Earth provides a quality

baseline reading of the Earth's atmosphere.

A reading of what then, exactly? Air is just air,

right? Well, not exactly. While most of the air

in the atmosphere is nitrogen and oxygen, there

is a small percentage of other gases. Even small

changes in those gases can have a huge impact on

the Earth. One example of how a change in the

composition of the atmosphere can have an impact

is in the climate. Two big players in the warming

of the atmosphere are carbon dioxide and methane,

among others. Gases such as these trap heat

inside the atmosphere, making the planet warmer.

NOAA is one of many organizations across the

globe who continuously monitor the changing

atmosphere of the Earth.

A graph of CO2 in the atmosphere over time,

showing the increase has been speeding up. (NOAA)

The Earth's climate is observed to be changing,

with no signs of slowing down. That's not good.

However, I don't want to end this newsletter on

a such a depressing note. Instead, I'll end with

a success story about how we humans have made

necessary change when it was needed. I want to

tell you about ozone (O3) and how we protected

it from nasty, human-made substances.

Ozone in the upper atmosphere, specifically the

stratosphere, is important. It acts as a shield

against UV light that is harmful to many living

things, including ourselves. Normally, ozone is

prevalent in the stratosphere and naturally acts

as this shield. However, the 1900s saw the

invention of modern-day air conditioning and

refrigerators. In order to function, these types

of cooling units used chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs)

as refrigerants. CFCs have also been used for

other applications, such as aerosol sprays and

a foaming agent in building insulation.

The ozone depletion mechanism illustrated. (AFP)

The key thing here is that this CFC substance

became mass-produced, which is bad because of

the "chloro" part of their name, meaning it

contains chlorine. When the CFCs are emitted and

mix into the atmosphere, they will eventually

reach the stratosphere - right where the ozone

is. Then, disaster happens: UV sun rays break the

chlorine off of the CFC, which itself then

destroys the ozone. To prevent more CFCs from

being produced, 27 global nations signed the

Montreal Protocol in 1987, which included

restrictions on the creation of CFCs, until they

were later banned altogether. Substitutes became

used instead, such as a slightly better stopgap,

called hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs),

until the eventual replacements with no chlorine,

called hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), were created.

A graph of ozone-depleting substances over time,

showing a decline in harmful CFCs and trends in

their replacements, HCFCs and HFCs. (NOAA)

The response to the rise in ozone-depleting

substances is a great success story on how we

humans have responded to our changing planet.

Let's see if we can make a similar, collective

response to the rising level of greenhouse gases

in our atmosphere.

I'll leave you with an update on my whereabouts:

I am currently in American Samoa filling in for

the Station Chief while he goes on vacation for

a couple weeks. I've had a great time here,

conducting balloon launches, taking air samples,

and keeping the instrumentation running.

A distant view of the American Samoa observatory.